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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26667574">Le voleur de joie</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/ennuithereyet/pseuds/ennuithereyet'>ennuithereyet</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Découverte [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Call Me By Your Name (2017) RPF</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>(kind of), Drabble, Established Relationship, Facial Hair, Gender Confusion, Gender Issues, Light Angst, Nonbinary Character, Open Relationships, Potential accidental misgendering, body image issues, small mention of eating disorders</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-09-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-09-27</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 12:21:04</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,238</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26667574</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/ennuithereyet/pseuds/ennuithereyet</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>It came to a head one day when he and Armie were laying together, naked and drawing idle patterns on each other’s skin, soaking in the warmth of the summer sun shining through the window. They exchanged some lazy kisses, and Armie’s fingers came up to touch just above Timmy’s upper lip.</p><p>“Someone needs to shave,” he teased gently.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Timothée Chalamet/Armie Hammer</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Découverte [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1948588</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>51</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Chapter 1</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Inspired by a scene in an RP with my lovely friend, Jules, which left me with the deep desire to write something exploring nonbinary!Timmy. Hopefully there will be more to this because I have ideas for a few different scenes of Timmy figuring out gender shit, and I want to also continue this particular scene too, but I make no promises because I'm a piece of shit who has commitment issues when it comes to writing. </p><p>There's one small reference to eating disorders in the second paragraph but it is not something that affects any characters in the fic, nor is it detailed in any way. You can just skip the second paragraph if you think it might be an issue.<br/>There is a major theme in this whole work of body image issues that are partially rooted in dysphoria, but it's not explicitly about dysphoria, if that makes sense. But if you get triggered by texts about dysphoria, I would suggest treading carefully here.</p><p>Also I want to make it clear this fic is not saying that IRL Timmy is necessarily nonbinary himself; he has not indicated one way or the other. This fic is entirely fiction.</p><p>Un-beta'ed because we die like men.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  
  <span>It wasn’t as if he’d ever really been a man’s man. Timmy knew that. He knew that from the way his high school friends would jokingly call him a twink. He knew that from the conversations with Brian about what kinds of roles he could audition for with his “image.” He knew it from all the times he went shopping and all the clothes he tried on hung loosely from his frame in a way that wasn’t </span>
  <em>
    <span>terrible</span>
  </em>
  <span>, necessarily, but it wasn’t what he wanted, either; wasn’t what he thought of when he thought of a man. </span>
  <em>
    <span>He </span>
  </em>
  <span>wasn’t what he thought of when he thought of a man. Sometimes he didn’t mind that. Sometimes he did. </span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>Everyone was insecure about their body though, he reminded himself, especially actors. He remembered in health class in high school, how they always emphasized the unit on eating disorders, told them that just because they were performers and because the industry valued their image above everything else, that didn’t mean they could stop prioritizing their own health. And he knew people who fell into the trap of treating themselves badly in order to play a part or have the right look or something like that. And he didn’t want to do that, either. He tried to exercise and eat at least a couple vegetables a week, and he couldn’t say that he </span>
  <em>
    <span>hated</span>
  </em>
  <span> how he looked, except sometimes when he kind of did. But most of the time, he didn’t. </span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>One thing that didn’t help his body image issues, he realized, was filming a movie where he’d be naked and on camera with a guy who basically looked like Captain America (though Armie was hotter than Chris Evans, actually, Timmy thought, but he didn’t say it because Armie would never stop teasing him for having even thought to make the comparison). And yes, Timmy was the luckiest guy in the world to get a lead role in a film directed by Luca and to be starring next to Armie Hammer and to also get paid to make out with Armie on camera all summer in Italy. Okay, so there was a </span>
  <em>
    <span>tad</span>
  </em>
  <span> bit more work to it than that, but the point was: the job came with definite perks. </span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>But watching Armie walk around shirtless and in the tiniest shorts for weeks of filming? That resulted in Timmy’s mind doing a lot of comparison. How could he not compare them when he could hear Armie complaining about having to shave twice a day since Oliver wasn’t allowed to have stubble; when he saw the way the sun glinted off the soft blonde hair on Armie’s chest and legs; when they kissed and Armie grabbed him by the waist and his hands were big enough his fingers could nearly touch. And Timmy didn’t know if he was envious or horny, or both.</span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>(Both. It was definitely both.)</span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>He found it so hard to drag his eyes away from the man. It was stupid, </span>
  <em>
    <span>he</span>
  </em>
  <span> was stupid, he knew, because you didn’t just </span>
  <em>
    <span>get a crush on your co-star</span>
  </em>
  <span> and you especially didn’t do it when the movie had a ton of sex scenes and you </span>
  <em>
    <span>especially</span>
  </em>
  <span> didn’t do it when the co-star was significantly more established than you were and also straight and also married with a kid. So Timmy berated himself internally and tried to be subtle when he looked.</span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>His mom had told him once that he wasn’t great at subtlety when he wasn’t playing a role. </span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>Somehow, and he still felt like he didn’t fully understand how it happened, he and Armie developed a Thing. He tried not to think about it as a relationship, because that seemed so much bigger and formal and it would probably require discussions about What They Were and Where Things Were Going and it was all just… too much for the small, intimate moment they were inhabiting as they filmed. They talked about the fact that Armie was married, of course, because the thought of being the Other Woman in a relationship (Other Man? But since Liz was a woman, that term didn’t work either… Other Person, Timmy decided, satisfied with that) made Timmy nauseous and unable to look at himself in the mirror. But Armie explained the arrangement he and Liz had, the terms under which their relationship was an open one, and they’d video chatted all three of them, and he could be satisfied knowing he wasn’t helping someone cheat on their partner, and so he and Armie had started their Thing. </span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>The Thing only gave Timmy more opportunity to learn Armie’s body and find ways to compare it to his own. Which he knew was stupid. He remembered one of those inspirational quotes a friend of his posted on her Instagram a while back that said, “Comparison is the thief of joy” and he had thought that was cool and true and now he tried to actually get that to sink in deep enough that he’d stop comparing, but he didn’t. </span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>And his comparisons confused him, too. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It came to a head one day when he and Armie were laying together, naked and drawing idle patterns on each other’s skin, soaking in the warmth of the summer sun shining through the window. They exchanged some lazy kisses, and Armie’s fingers came up to touch just above Timmy’s upper lip.</span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>“Someone needs to shave,” he teased gently.</span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>“Hm?” Timmy asked, feeling his chin and realizing he did have some hair growing out. He smiled a bit. “Oh. See, and here I thought that maybe you were having some remorse for </span>
  <em>
    <span>this</span>
  </em>
  <span>-” He rubbed his hand over the stubble on Armie’s jaw, “- giving me beard burn earlier.”</span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>Armie laughed. “No, I know you like that, so I don’t feel any remorse for it.” </span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>“No ragrets,” Timmy murmured.</span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>“You fucking- no memes in the bedroom, okay?” Armie said, his exasperation making Timmy snicker. </span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>“Just because you’re an old man who doesn’t understand the hip youth of today-” Timmy began, only to be cut off when Armie dug his fingers into his sides. He yelped, half in surprise, half in laughter, and tried to fight Armie off.</span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>“You say that now, but it looks like you’re becoming a man now too, you know,” Armie teased, finally relenting and letting Timmy grab his wrists to push them away from his ticklish sides. </span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>And Timmy wanted to keep the atmosphere light, but something about what Armie said just… hit him wrong. He felt, for some reason, like he’d been punched in the gut, not enough to really hurt but for the air to get knocked right out of him. He recovered quickly, not wanting Armie to think something was wrong, and he laughed at the comment like he knew Armie had intended for him to.</span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>Armie had been able to read him too easily, right from the very moment they met, and this was no different. He had realized that Timmy’s laugh wasn’t a genuine one. “Tim?” he asked, face softening into concern. He brought a hand up to cup Timmy’s cheek like he was something fragile, and Timmy just- He couldn’t.</span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>He pulled away and sat up, stretching his arms to give himself an excuse for doing so. “Hm?” he asked, like he had no clue why Armie was worried.</span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>Armie wasn’t stupid, though. He sat up as well, trying to look Timmy in the eye even though Tim was trying to keep his face casually away from the man. “Tim, that was- Shit. I shouldn’t have said that,” he said, correctly guessing what had caused the change in mood, even if Timmy didn’t even know </span>
  <em>
    <span>what</span>
  </em>
  <span> exactly the problem was to begin with.</span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>“What?” Timmy asked. He felt a bit nauseous, and his brain was doing that thing where he had so many thoughts whizzing around that it was impossible to pin down any one of them.</span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>“I- You know that being able to grow a beard has nothing to do with being a man, right?” Armie asked, reaching out and placing his hand on Tim’s arm. “I meant it as a joke, but it- it wasn’t a good one. I wasn’t trying to make it sound like you weren’t a man now. You are.”</span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>And that… only made the pit in Timmy’s stomach grow deeper, if he was being honest. But he didn’t know how to say that, because he had no clue why he felt that way to begin with. “I didn’t think that’s what you were trying to say at all,” he told Armie, and at least that was the truth. The thought hadn’t even occurred to him, really. He couldn’t pin down the thoughts bouncing around inside his head, but he knew that wasn’t among them.</span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>Armie looked equally relieved and confused. “Oh,” he said. “Good, that’s- because I didn’t mean it that way, at all. It was a shitty joke.” </span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>Timmy found himself nodding, his bottom lip a bit sore, and he realized he’d been chewing on it nervously. “I know,” he told Armie. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Neither of them said anything then, and it was awkward, and they both knew it, and they knew the other knew it too, but neither of them knew how to fix it. </span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>“I should probably go shave before we have to leave then,” Timmy finally said, the words a bit rushed, like by talking fast he could somehow get them to go occupy the awkward moment just before them. </span>
</p><p>
  
  <span>Armie just looked at him as Timmy scrambled off the bed and to the bathroom. Timmy felt small under his gaze, or rather, he felt vulnerable, like Armie was going to see right under his skin. Normally Timmy liked it when Armie read him like a book, but there was still that concern in Armie’s eyes that made him feel like Armie would end up seeing something Timmy didn’t even see himself, and so he hurried into the bathroom and closed the door to try to escape it.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Chapter 2</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p><em>Everyone has insecurities,</em> he told himself, as if that made any difference.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Guess who wasn't a piece of shit and managed to get part 2 of this written already! Your lovely comments certainly helped inspire me, though.</p>
<p>Same dysphoria warning from last chapter, as Timmy's still figuring out how he feels about his body. There's also minor allusions to potential accidental misgendering on Armie's part, so that's something to be aware of; it's entirely unintentional though and Timmy doesn't even recognize it as misgendering at this point. </p>
<p>This part is pretty heavy on the angst, just a warning haha. But I've got plans for more drabbles in the NB!Timmy verse. Since it might not be linear and will probably jump around some, I think I'll make it a series rather than a single fic, so be on the lookout for that if you're interested in more. The series will get more positive, I promise, it's just that gender is hard and confusing and in this fic Timmy is really just starting to question it. </p>
<p>Still un-beta'ed because I can't be arsed to do more editing than one quick look through it.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  
  <span>The bathroom door closed behind him and Timmy leaned on the counter, staring down at the sink because he didn’t want to look in the mirror. He focused on taking deep, even breaths for a minute, trying to shake that gut-punch feeling that came as a reaction to Armie’s words. When the hole in his stomach seemed to have stitched itself up some, he let himself think.</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>What </span>
  <em>
    <span>was</span>
  </em>
  <span> that? What had even just happened? He played the events over in his mind, trying to make some sense about them all.</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>He and Armie had been just laying there, and then Armie noted how Timmy had some facial hair growing in. There was nothing wrong with that, it was a benign comment, but for some reason, even thinking about that moment made something squirm uncomfortably in Timmy’s gut. </span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>He looked up at his reflection in the mirror. He was paler than usual, and he didn’t dwell on the mix of emotions playing out on his face but instead focused on his chin and upper lip. The sparse dark hairs sprouting there stood out in contrast to his light skin, so even though they were only a couple of millimeters long, they were obvious. </span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <em>
    <span>It looks like you’re becoming a man now too, </span>
  </em>
  <span>Armie had said, and he’d been joking but Timmy had heard those jokes before, and he had always laughed along but never really found them funny, same as when people joked about how he was just skin and bones, telling him to eat something and get some meat on him. Because it wasn’t like he controlled any of that. It was his body, but he didn’t control it like that. </span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>He brought a finger up to his face and ran his nail over some of the sparse hairs. It wasn’t even a real mustache, not even the beginnings of one. It was something you’d expect from a kid just going through puberty, to be accompanied by a cracking voice and hormonal acne. </span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <em>
    <span>Maybe one day you’ll go through puberty too, Chalamet,</span>
  </em>
  <span> he remembered a friend in high school joking, because it was always a joke, at least to them.</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>He would rather not grow any facial hair at all. He would rather not deal with keeping shaving supplies around to use them just once every couple of weeks. He would rather not know that even if he kept growing it out, it would be patchy and do weird things to the line of his jaw. He would rather never have to think about it, because he naively thought that if no stubble ever appeared, he wouldn’t dwell on it at all. No, he would much rather just always appear clean shaven.</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <em>
    <span>Everyone has insecurities</span>
  </em>
  <span>, he told himself, as if that made any difference.</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>He moved to his toiletries bag to find his razor and the travel-sized bottle of shaving cream. Most of his things lived in their own spaces in the bathroom now: his toothbrush in a cup next to Armie’s; his comb and hairbrush on a shelf next to the sink; his mousse in the medicine cabinet next to Armie’s gel; his shampoo and conditioner and soap lined up neatly in the shower organizer. Those were things he used nearly every day, though, things that had naturally found a home amongst Armie’s things. The razor and shaving cream, however, did not live next to Armie’s on the counter. There was no need for them to clutter that space.</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <em>
    <span>You know that being able to grow a beard has nothing to do with being a man, right? </span>
  </em>
  <span>Armie had said, and he’d been right, Timmy knew that, but it hadn’t </span>
  <em>
    <span>felt</span>
  </em>
  <span> right, he thought as he began to shave. Which, okay, he had heard about toxic masculinity and things like that, so he knew where it was coming from, and he knew it was bullshit to equate the ability to grow a beard to being a man, but knowing something was bullshit didn’t stop you from feeling it. </span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>He would rather not grow any facial hair at all.</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>The razor nicked the skin of his upper lip and he swore under his breath at the hint of pain, setting down the razor and tearing off a tiny piece of toilet paper and sticking it to the bead of blood welling up from the cut. </span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>He looked at himself in the mirror.</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <em>
    <span>I’m a mess, aren’t I? </span>
  </em>
  <span>Elio tells Oliver when he gets a nosebleed.</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <em>
    <span>I guess,</span>
  </em>
  <span> Oliver replies. </span>
  <em>
    <span>The ancients said it never hurt to be bled from time to time.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>Timmy resumed his shaving, trying to be a bit more careful.</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>He felt like he was being overdramatic. And okay, he was an actor, so maybe he was entitled to a bit of that, and compared to most of his classmates back in school he actually felt he was usually pretty chill, but this was all a stupid thing to have this kind of reaction over.</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>And he didn’t even know </span>
  <em>
    <span>what</span>
  </em>
  <span> his reaction was! He was annoyed at his body for not being able to grow real facial hair, but he was annoyed at his body for growing facial hair in the first place. He was annoyed that he would never be considered for roles like superheroes or action stars but he didn’t want to play them anyway. He wanted to look more buff and masculine and manly but he didn’t, because he didn’t actually hate the way he looked, and if he didn’t look like this he wasn’t sure who he’d be anymore.</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <em>
    <span>I wasn’t trying to make it sound like you weren’t a man now. You are.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    
  </em>
  <span>Why did that bother him so much? Timmy tried to figure it out as he finished shaving and rinsed off his face. Logically, it shouldn’t. For the other things he was upset about, there were clear explanations as to why, but for this… Timmy couldn’t explain the way it gnawed at his stomach.</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <em>
    <span>You are.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>Was it because he didn’t believe it? Because in many ways, Timmy still felt like just a kid who stumbled into anything good that had ever happened to him rather than actually earning it. He felt like the puberty-riddled teen he often looked like, who he was playing on camera, and it made sense since he wasn’t so far away from those years. He was technically an adult now, but he thought about that only in the most technical sense. He didn’t feel like it.</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>He didn’t feel like a man, either. </span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>“I’m a mess, aren’t I?” he murmured to his reflection.</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>He had thought, at some point, that there came a time in your life where you woke up and realized that you were an adult and you knew everything that came along with that. But Timmy had talked with adults about it and they all agreed that it wasn’t true; that every adult was just pretending to know what to do until they did it so often it didn’t feel like pretending anymore.</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>He didn’t feel like a man, either.</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <em>
    <span>You are.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>Maybe he just had to keep pretending.</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>He put the razor and shaving cream away in his toiletries bag, since it’d be some time until he needed them again. He stored the bag in the under-sink cabinet and he cleaned any stray hairs that had gotten on the counter. He removed the bit of tissue from his no longer bleeding cut, tossing it in the bin. He took a deep breath and opened the door.</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>Armie was still on the bed, scrolling through something on his phone in a way that Timmy thought was too casual, as was the way Armie looked up and said, “Hey.” There were a lot of unspoken words inside that greeting.</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>“Hey,” Timmy replied. He went to the closet and started picking out clothes just to provide himself with an excuse to avoid looking at Armie’s poorly hidden concern. “We’ve gotta leave soon, right?”</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>“Yeah, in a few minutes.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>Timmy nodded and started getting dressed. </span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>“Everything okay?” Armie asked. He got out of bed and started getting dressed, too.</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>“Hm? Yeah, yeah,” Timmy said, like he had no clue why Armie was asking even though they both knew he knew exactly why.</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>They had gotten mostly dressed by the time Armie finally asked, “You wanna talk about it?”</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>Timmy shrugged, aiming for casual and ending up awkward. “Nothing to say,” he said.</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>Armie looked at him for a long moment as Timmy pulled on a t-shirt. “Okay,” he finally said, and in that “okay” Timmy heard </span>
  <em>
    <span>I know you’re lying but I don’t want to push</span>
  </em>
  <span> and </span>
  <em>
    <span>you can tell me anything, you know? </span>
  </em>
  <span>and </span>
  <em>
    <span>please tell me what you’re feeling so I don’t hurt you again</span>
  </em>
  <span> and </span>
  <em>
    <span>we said no secrets but I won’t hold it against you if you don’t have the words for this </span>
  </em>
  <span>and </span>
  <em>
    <span>I care about you, Tim</span>
  </em>
  <span>. </span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>Timmy walked over to him and went up on his toes to press a soft kiss to Armie’s lips, and then to his jaw. “You should shave before we leave too,” he reminded him with a smile, running a hand over Armie’s stubbly cheek.</span>
</p>
<p>
  
  <span>“Right,” Armie said, and he watched Timmy for another moment, getting some socks, unplugging his phone from the charger, and then Armie turned, going into the bathroom to take care of his own stubble.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
</body>
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